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Trans fats were often found in fried goods in fast-food restaurants. Most major chains have eliminated the manufactured substance because of health dangers, although some still use it. / Provided/Shutterstock

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They are both unnoticeable in food and they are deadly. Yet chances are when Salinas consumers go grocery shopping, they are buying products that still contain trans fats, often without knowing it.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced Wednesday that it is, for all intents and purposes, putting the kibosh on the manufactured fat because of the toll it takes on the human cardiovascular system. Dr. Margaret A. Hamburg, the FDA’s commissioner, said the rules could prevent 20,000 heart attacks and 7,000 deaths from heart disease each year.

“This is a toxic fat,” said Dr. Timothy Albert, a cardiologist with the Salinas Valley Memorial Healthcare System and an expert in preventive cardiology. “It promotes hardening of the arteries, which is more likely to cause patients to develop coronary-artery disease.”

Though the FDA is the federal agency charged with ensuring Americans have a safe food supply, it is has been one of the last institutions to act. The scientific and medical communities have been harping about the substance for three decades, prompting many in the manufactured food industry to proactively remove the substance from its products. Scientific evidence has shown that these fats are worse than any other fat — including saturated animal fat — for health because they raise the levels of so-called bad cholesterol and can lower the levels of good cholesterol, Albert said.

Research studies over several decades have unequivocally shown direct correlations between high levels of bad cholesterol – also called low-density lipoproteins, or LDLs – and low levels of good cholesterol, also called high-density lipoproteins, or HDLs, and cardiovascular disease.

In 2006, an FDA rule went into effect requiring that artificial trans fats be listed on food labels, a shift that prompted the move by large producers to eliminate them. A year earlier, New York City told restaurants to stop using artificial trans fats in cooking. Many major chains like McDonald’s, found substitutes and eliminated trans fats.

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Trans fats date back to the turn of the century, when the manufactured food industry began looking for ways to preserve foods longer, Albert explained. Trans fat is also known as “partially hydrogenated oils” or vegetable shortening. It is made by bubbling hydrogen through hot vegetable oil. This chemically converts the liquid oil into a fat that is solid at room temperature.

Food manufacturers use hydrogenated vegetable oils for texture, to increase product shelf life and keep flavors stable. It is most commonly used in some baked goods, canned frosting, stick margarine, coffee creamers and microwave popcorn, according to the FDA.

“It’s normally not something you would use in your kitchen,” Albert said. “It’s the reason why you can go into a convenience store and have products on the shelf for five years and it doesn’t spoil.”

Crisco, the gold standard in home baking, used to use hydrogenated oils but since the public was alerted to the dangers, has found a non-trans-fat substitute.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest, which has been an outspoken opponent of trans fat, identified Sara Lee cheesecakes, Betty Crocker cake mix, and Pop Secret popcorn as listing partially hydrogenated oils in their ingredients. It also identified some fast-food chains, including Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen, that still use trans fats in some products.

Consumers need to remain vigilant, however. For example, a powdered coffee creamer, called N’Joy and made by Sugar Foods Corp. in New York can be found in offices throughout the U.S., including here at The Salinas Californian. On its nutrition label it claims to have zero total fat. Yet on closer inspection it also says there are five calories worth of fat. Drilling deeper into the ingredients and it is discloses that it contains “partially hydrogenated soybean oil” — a trans fat.

So why the discrepancy? A footnote explains that the product is “not a significant source of trans fat,” among others. But what is considered “significant?”

The FDA is “responding to the fact that there really is no safe level of consumption of trans fat,” said FDA Commissioner Hamburg in a news release.

The proposed new rule, which the FDA has opened to public comment for 60 days, would eliminate such ambiguities. That means companies would have to prove scientifically that partially hydrogenated oils are safe to eat, a very high hurdle given that scientific literature overwhelmingly shows the contrary.

The best rule of thumb for consumers is the oft-quoted statement from Michael Pollen’s groundbreaking book, “In Defense of Food,” in which he advises, “Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.”

Dennis L. Taylor writes about health for The Salinas Californian. Follow him on Twitter @taylor_salnews.com.